


Silver, Gold, Diamond

by Amazing_E_ko



Category: Shoujo Kakumei Utena | Revolutionary Girl Utena
Genre: Domestic, F/F, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-25
Updated: 2013-03-25
Packaged: 2017-12-06 11:32:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/735177
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amazing_E_ko/pseuds/Amazing_E_ko
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An Utena/Anthy fic about the three big anniversaries, and the ways that they celebrate them together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Silver, Gold, Diamond

**Author's Note:**

> Haha this is another entry in the E-ko writes shameless fluff for couples she likes series.  
> I've seen lots of post-series Utena/Anthy fic that deals with Anthy as the witch, and how they come to terms with that. And I love all those fics very dearly. But I thought there was space to talk about the other possibility - that Anthy really did give up all her power, and that she and Utena had nothing more than an ordinary life. And so I wrote that fic.
> 
> Huge thanks to my beta, @pyjamaterra on Plurk, who gave this a read and gave me awesome feedback. It was really helpful, and any remaining errors are my fault alone. <3
> 
> (Edited for some minor repetitions and grammatical errors, which I noticed on a reread. They don't change anything about the story though.)

**Silver**

 

It was a hazy September afternoon in Marseille, and the sun slanted down between the high, narrow buildings to warm the cobbled streets. There was a smell of sea and fish in the air, and overlying it the stronger scents of flowers and spices from the surrounding houses. A little girl of seven or eight, with long black hair and a cheerful face, climbed upwards through the winding alleys, puffing and panting at the effort. On her back was her school bag, and she was wearing the uniform of the local primary school. She groaned quietly as she walked, pushing herself on one step at a time, until at last she was over the crest of the hill. She turned through an arch, and passed under cold stone to a little sunny courtyard filled with late-blooming roses and clematis.

There was a tea shop in one corner of the courtyard, with neat ironwork tables outside. Several guests were sitting there, smoking and drinking tea. They waved to the girl as she passed, and old Gamouh patted her head with one of his huge hands.

“Home again, little Mariko,” he said, puffing away at his cigar.

Mariko nodded. “Is Maman here?”

“No, but your Mama is just inside.”

Mariko nodded again, and stepped through the glass door. The inside of the teahouse was as lush with vegetation as the outside, and there were squishy seats everywhere. On one wall a bookshelf stood, stacked with books for the customers to take. Mariko liked to look at them, and feel their bindings and spines, but she could read very few of them, since many were written in English or Japanese, and even those in French were difficult.

Today, though, she had no time even for looking. There were more important matters at hand. She pushed past the bead curtain that separated the kitchen from the front of the café, and found her Mama preparing a tray with gold-rimmed cups and flaky madeleines.

Mariko considered Mama to be the most beautiful person in the world. She had rich, dark skin that gleamed where the sun touched it, and brilliant green eyes that always seemed to shine – especially when she looked at Maman. Even at forty, with little lines carved around her mouth and eyes, and hands that were toughened from years of gardening, she was lovely. Mariko had often wished that they looked more alike.

“Welcome home, Mariko,” Anthy said, turning around to look at her daughter, “did you have a nice day at school?” She spoke in Japanese, which was the Tenjou household’s family language. At school Mariko spoke French, but at home Japanese and English were more common.

“I got a hundred on my test,” Mariko said. “And Maman said she’d buy me cake if I did. But she’s not here, so will you give me some?”

Anthy eyes bored into Mariko, and Mariko put on her most truthful face, her eyes widening and her mouth crooking up into a little smile. With Maman this was a sure way to succeed – Maman found it hard to resist Mariko even when she was being cross and sulky. But Mama was a different matter. Much as Mariko loved Mama, she sometimes found her strange, and distant, and stern. Today, though, Mama just smiled.

“Go and sit down and start your homework,” she said, “and I’ll bring you cake when I’ve served Guilliam.”

 

*

 

Anthy was as good as her word, and she soon came to sit with Mariko, bringing two slices of sachertorte and a pot of rosehip tea with her. They ate and talked, or rather Mariko talked, telling Anthy the minute details of her day. Anthy was content to listen and watch, her chin cupped in one hand. As Mariko talked she felt a faint pressure on her eyes, and she had to blink rapidly to keep it back. Even now, so many years and miles away from Ohtori, she found herself startled by the ordinary things. Large events did not move her – tragic accidents, suffering and even funerals she could bear with composure – but the little moments dug at her heart.

“Mama, are you alright?”

Anthy froze, and was saved from answering only by Utena’s sudden entrance.

Utena had not aged as gracefully as Anthy, though Anthy would have had something to say to anyone who called her less beautiful. She had cut her hair very short, and what was left was shot through with early streaks of grey, which she wore proudly. Her face was lined and tanned by years of working outside in the sun, and she had a slight limp from a leg injury years earlier. Right now she was drenched in sweat, a soaked towel flopping around her shoulders. She had been training the lycée girls lacrosse team, as she did every Thursday.

Without hesitating Utena crossed the room and kissed Anthy soundly on the lips. Anthy leant up into the kiss, as familiar and as new as every kiss these past twenty-five years had been. Across the table, Mariko made the vaguely disgusted face that all children make when they see parents displaying affection.

Utena broke the kiss at last, and flopped down on the seat next to Mariko to tickle her.

“I wish you’d wash before you sit on my customers’ chairs,” Anthy said mildly, and Utena shot her a contrite grin.

“In a moment.” She turned her attention back to Mariko, nuzzling her ear and making her squeak. Utena was the most devoted and affectionate of parents, and Anthy loved to see her with their daughter.

“Alice is going to come and look after you tonight,” Utena said, smiling. “Won’t that be fun?”

Mariko looked up sharply, her facing collapsing into a pout.

“Why? Where are you going?”

“Anthy and I have a very important appointment with dinner,” Utena said, winking.

“Why can’t I come?”

“Because this is a special night for Mama and Maman,” Utena said. “Today was the day we met, twenty-five years ago. That’s pretty important, you know.”

“But Mama told me you met in April,” Mariko said. “And it’s September now.”

Anthy sighed, and leant across the table to tuck Mariko’s hair behind her ear, and stop it from getting into the sachertorte crumbs.

“We did,” Anthy said. “And then we met again, in September. We count from our second meeting, not our first.”

“Why?” Mariko said, and Utena shot a curious glance across the table. This was not the first time the subject of Ohtori had loomed, but Utena always left it up to Anthy to speak, and so far Anthy had said nothing. Today was no different.

“Oh, I was very different then,” Anthy said. Someday, she would tell Mariko the whole truth, but not yet.

Mariko nodded and then, distracted by something, began telling Utena about the insect she had seen at lunch.

“Before you distract your Maman entirely,” Anthy said, “I want her to go and take a shower.”

Utena groaned.

“Your Mama is a slave driver, you know that?” she said to Mariko, and scooting the girl off her lap she stood up, bending to give Anthy another kiss and then heading upstairs to their own part of the house.

 

*

 

Anthy and Utena came stumbling home at about half two, clinging tightly to each other and giggling like teenagers. The dinner had been good, and the wine excellent, and they were both buoyed up by the simmer of alcohol in their veins.

Utena, who believed in being traditional, had bought Anthy a silver and pearl necklace, patterned with flying birds. Anthy, who believed in being pragmatic, had bought them a family holiday to the Greek islands next April. They had gone to an old jazz club, full of North African musicians, and danced for hours, and when the club shut, they had walked home by way of the port, where the boats lay resting like a flock of sleeping seagulls and the black water was laced with the orange reflections of the streetlights.

They paid Alice, added a little extra, and Utena walked her home while Anthy looked in on Mariko. It was only later, when they were tucked up in bed, Utena’s body wrapped firmly around Anthy’s, that Anthy spoke.

“Sometimes it frightens me, how much I love Mariko.”

“I know,” Utena said, pressing a kiss into Anthy’s shoulder.

“I wasn’t made for love. It was all burned out of me. I thought it was a miracle that I was even able to love you. How can I possibly love her too?”

“You were made for everything good,” Utena said. “Anthy, you’ve proven that to me so many times. You don’t have to be afraid of yourself. And Mariko loves you just as much as she loves me. She’s always telling me how beautiful you are, and how much she wants to look like you. She thinks you’re clever, too. She really admires the plants you grow.”

Anthy rolled over in Utena’s arms, so that she could look at Utena’s face, illuminated by the light coming through the gap in the curtains.

“Thank you,” she said, because what else could she say? “Thank you for everything. Thank you for the past twenty-five years, and thank you for the time before them, and thank you for Mariko, and thank you for you. I think I’ve had the best life anyone’s ever had.”

“Well it’s not over yet,” Utena said, smiling. “I mean, we’re still young. Only forty.” She sighed, her breath hot on Anthy’s ear. “I’ve been thinking, actually.” She stopped, and was silent for so long that Anthy nudged her to make sure she was awake. “It’s lovely to see Mariko grow up, but I can’t help feeling sad, too. Young children are so wonderful. And I was thinking that I wouldn’t mind doing it again.”

“You want to adopt another child?” Anthy did not try to keep the panic out of her voice. It was a repeat of the moment, eight years earlier, when Utena had been called to say that her distant cousin had died, leaving a two-month-old child with no other relatives. Utena had been delighted. Anthy had been petrified. How could she let another human being into the precious space she had made with Utena? It was hers, and hers alone.

But this time she knew better. Her heart had not shrivelled and died. It had grown bigger, and stronger. It would do so again, once the first fearful moment faded.

“I think we should talk about it properly,” Anthy said. “At the weekend.” She kissed Utena, to show that she was not being defensive, and for a while they were very distracted. When at last they broke apart again, Utena flopped back on the pillow and sighed, stretching her hands up to the ceiling.

“I wish tomorrow was Saturday,” she said. “I don’t want to work. I just want to lie in bed with you and read books.”

Anthy smiled in the dark.

“It’s only one day,” she said. “And now we have a plan for Saturday.” They both laughed, and then there was silence, and soon after, sleep.

 

**Gold**

 

Utena adjusted and readjusted her tie in the hallway mirror.

“Do you think I got the knot right?” she said, looking critically at her own reflection. Anthy did not even glance at her.

“You look absolutely fine. Stop fidgeting. The taxi will be here in a minute.”

Utena laughed and turned around.

“This feels like our wedding all over again,” she said. “Can you blame me for being nervous?”

Anthy smiled.

“There were three people at our wedding, not including ourselves. This is much worse. So no.” She held out a hand and Utena came to sit beside her, interlocking her fingers with Anthy’s.

Twenty-five years had come and gone since they met in that hospital room, and another twenty-five again. They were both sixty-five now, and they looked it. Anthy’s hair was white, Utena’s steel grey. They were both lined by age, their skin beginning to sag slightly, and Anthy’s hands no longer had the flexibility they had once had. In the winter she could feel her joints twinging, and she caught cold more and more easily. Her body was wearing out. It was an oddly delightful sensation.

The taxi driver finally arrived, and they left Mariko’s Paris apartment, heading for Le Bristol. It was an old hotel, one of the most expensive in Paris. There were doormen to bow when they entered, and the reception room was done up in cream and gold, chandeliers dripping with crystal and heavy drapes that let in the riotous colour of the garden. Anthy was overwhelmed. It reminded her, in a faintly nauseating way, of the excesses of Ohtori.

She might have left, if Utena hadn’t held her arm so firmly, and before she could gather her thoughts Mariko was upon them, her husband Francois trailing patiently behind her. Mariko hugged them both, warm tears in her eyes, and led them to their place at the top of the table. Aftan, who was almost ten years younger than Mariko, met them there, and gave them a much more restrained greeting.

Anthy would have been content with just her family for guests, but Mariko was not so restrained, and she seemed to have rounded up every friend Anthy and Utena had ever made. It was daunting, but Anthy was genuinely touched, and more than once had to dab her eyes surreptitiously with her handkerchief.

The dinner was elaborate and delicious in equal measure. Anthy ate enough to make the binding of her obi feel uncomfortably tight. She had chosen to wear a traditional kimono partly to acknowledge her roots (or at least her most recent version of those roots), but also because she hated European formal-wear. The sweeping dresses reminded her too painfully of her old rose bride costume. It made her look a little odd next to Utena in her black tie suit, but that didn’t matter. They reflected themselves, and that was enough.

The dessert was brought in, an extravagant variation on crème brulee filled with ingredients that Anthy could hardly name. Champagne accompanied it, poured frothing into long flutes and topped with a raspberry. It looked delicious, but Anthy didn’t get to drink any for some time. The moment the glasses were poured, the speeches and toasts began. Some were funny, some were sweet, all were touching, but afterwards Anthy only really remembered the speeches her children gave. Mariko was tender, but also funny. She had a family of her own now, and had long since come to understand her parents as people in their own right.

“Every time Francois and I have a fight,” she said, “I think about my parents. Nobody has ever seen them fight, you know.” She winked cheerfully. “Of course, that doesn’t mean they don’t. They just do where you can’t see them.” She pointed straight at Anthy. “When Mama is cross she makes lemon and ginger tea, and she reads Plath and Bishop. Out loud, if she’s particularly annoyed. When Maman is angry she goes walking for hours.” Mariko smiled. “I’ve seen them fight about everything. Whose turn it is to do the dishes. Where they left the keys. Whether to paint the windows blue or yellow this year. Once, they fought about whether to get a tabby cat or a black cat. That was particularly vicious. They spent the whole day arguing on and off, while Mama was working. But what I really remember is that right in the middle, as they were hurling these really snide insults at each other, Mama went to get a box of tea from one of the high shelves. Well, I know you all know how small she is. She couldn’t reach. And while she was trying to pull it down, and getting more and more frustrated, Maman came over and got it down for her, just like that. And then they went on arguing. I’ve always thought that that’s the best way to behave in love. Even when you’re angry at the other person, you don’t stop trying to help them.”

There was a lot of laughter, and Utena and Anthy joined in gladly, holding hands tightly under the table.

Aftan’s speech was shorter, and less funny. He was only twenty-three, and being the baby of the family had made him rather shy. He started nervously, and it took him a few minutes to get where he wanted to go.

“I always loved fairy tales when I was little,” he said. “I loved stories about princes and princesses and wicked witches and dragons and knights. I used to read them all the time. Sometimes Maman would read them with me, but Mama never would. That always annoyed me, and one day I asked her why.” He swallowed and coughed. “She told me that she thought it would be a terrible misfortune to have a fairy tale love.”

There was some scattered laughter, which neither Utena or Anthy joined. Utena’s thumb, under the table, made tight little circles on Anthy’s hand.

“Uh, at the time I was pretty angry. I think I sulked for a week.  But as I got older, I understood what she meant. See, the thing is, my parents were already deeply in love when I was born. They’d been together for over twenty-five years. I don’t really know what their early relationship was like, and mostly, I find it really hard to imagine. Maybe it was just as sweet and simple as a fairy tale. But what I’ve seen, that old, strong love, is so much richer and more complicated than any fairy tale. It’s full of ordinary things, sure, and there aren’t any dragons or magic, but it has a power of its own. I don’t really understand what a relationship like there is like, but I really hope that some day I will.”

Anthy applauded politely, half from a parent’s pride and half from genuine emotion. She’d never told Aftan the truth about her life in Ohtori, though she knew she would have to do so soon. Mariko knew, and on the other side of the table her smile was sweet and uncertain, as no doubt was Anthy’s own.

 

*

 

Anthy stayed in the room for perhaps another forty-five minutes, talking to everyone, and then the pressure of the crowd became too much and she had to leave. She stepped through the doors into the inner garden of the hotel. The night air was chilly, and there was a pinch to the wind that said that frost was not far away, but Anthy pulled her heavy shawl around her shoulders and sat down anyway. A few straggling sweet-pea had fought against the coming autumn, and their warm, heavy fragrance filled the air. The central fountain splashed away quietly in the background, running over the chatter from the reception room and the more distant sounds of traffic. Anthy let her head fall back against the wall and relaxed.

After a little while she heard a noise nearby, and when she opened her eyes Utena was standing next to her.

“I thought you might be here,” Utena said, sitting down beside Anthy. One of her hands reached out and tidied Anthy’s long hair absently. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” Anthy said, smiling. “Crowds don’t bother me nearly as much as they used to. I’m just a little tired, that’s all.”

Utena raised an eyebrow, but said nothing more. There was silence for a little while.

“Are you here because I should go back in?” Anthy said. “I don’t particularly want to, but I don’t mind.”

“No, no,” Utena said, all in a rush. Even at sixty-five she was a heady, careless kind of person. Anthy had never changed her habit of rushing into situations without stopping to look at them first. “Actually, I came out here because I wanted to be alone with you. There’s something I want to give you.”

Anthy looked at her curiously. They had exchanged anniversary presents earlier, in front of the guests. Utena had given her a first edition copy of Orlando, a small, unassuming black book with a golden sheep stamped on the cover. Anthy had given Utena an original Van Gogh, something she’d acquired centuries earlier, and because she felt that she should spend some money she’d also bought her a new computer.

Utena reached down and lifted up a wrapped package, which she handed to Anthy. Anthy took it curiously and turned it over, testing the weight. It felt like a book. Carefully, she slit the tape on the wrapping with her thumb and folded back the heavy blue paper with her thumb. The book inside was covered in gold leaf, and there were what looked like several small gems set into the cover. She shot an amused glance at Utena, who shrugged.

“It’s our golden anniversary. I thought there should be gold.”

“You have the most extravagant tastes,” Anthy replied.

“You enable them,” Utena said, grinning, and she ducked in to give Anthy a kiss on the cheek.

Anthy didn’t recognise the cover of the book, and there was no title. Curious, she turned over the cover to the first page. There was a picture there, behind a layer of protective tissue. When Anthy turned that back too, she saw herself and Utena, aged twenty-one, on their wedding day. They were both wearing short dresses, Anthy’s pink and Utena’s blue. Anthy was carrying a bouquet of white flowers. They were standing just outside the colonnade of the town hall in Aurillac, a town in the Auvergne. It had been a rather spur of the moment decision. Their anniversary had been approaching, and Utena had suggested getting married. When they thought about it, there seemed no reason not to, and so they had.

Anthy looked at the picture for a long moment, then turned the page. Next were shots of her and Utena in the hospital, when Utena was rehabilitating. There were pictures from every year of their lives – pictures of their holidays, pictures of their houses, pictures of them alone, picture of them with friends and family. Anthy prided herself on having a good memory, and yet it was astonishing, the force with which her memories were brought back to her. How had she forgotten Julia’s birthday party, or the picnic in Montmartre when they were twenty-four?

“This is a wonderful gift, Utena,” she said, her voice scraping on the vowels. “Thank you so much.”

Utena took Anthy’s hands and looked at her straight on.

“I wanted to give you something to say how much I love you. I’ve always loved you, and I always will. Forever.”

Anthy said nothing. She looked carefully at Utena. There were more lines on her face than there had been last year. She sat with one shoulder held a little more tightly than the other. There was a scar near her hairline, which she had got from a kitchen cabinet almost fifteen years earlier. Her eyesight was beginning to fade a little, but she hadn’t yet got glasses, and made up for it by squinting.

“No, you won’t,” Anthy said. “You won’t love me forever. Someday, sooner now than it was ten years ago, you and I are going to die. Our love will live on, in the memories of our children, and our grandchildren, and in the things we leave behind us. And then, in about two hundred years, it will all be gone. We will be forgotten on this Earth, and our love will have been no more important than the love of any other two people.” Anthy brought Utena’s hand to her mouth and kissed it. “You have given me something much better than forever. You have given me a lifetime, and I will never be able to tell you how much that means to me.”

Utena leant forward, and her hands moved to encircle Anthy’s waist. In the dark of the garden they kissed, slowly and tenderly at first, and then with a flaring of the passion that had never left them. Utena’s fingers tangled in Anthy’s long, white hair, and Anthy set one hand at the back of Utena’s neck and the other on her hip. They breathed each other in, until they seemed to dissolve into one flesh and one being. That was how their children found them, when they came looking. They were hustled back inside with teasing comparisons to lovesick teenagers, to cut their cake and dance their dance. Neither one objected. They simply smiled at each other, a tender blush still painted on their cheeks, and the lingering taste of a fifty-year kiss on their lips.

 

**Diamond**

 

“It’s fine, Mariko. … No really, it’s fine. … Your daughter is graduating from primary school, and it’s important to celebrate her right now. Mama and I will be here next year. … Yes, I know this is a big anniversary, but don’t you think you’re assuming a little much? We managed fine without you for many of the others. We will be perfectly happy by ourselves. … Don’t give Aftan a hard time either. He’s very busy with work, and plane tickets from America are so expensive now. … I love you too. We’ll see you for Christmas. Say hi to Francois and the children for me.”

Utena hung up the phone with a solid beep and turned it off.

“I don’t know about you,” she said, turning to Anthy, “but I refuse to be contacted for the rest of the evening.”

Anthy smiled and held up her own dark phone in reply.

There was a knock on the door, and their carer Angelique stepped into the room.

“The caterers are here, ma’am. Shall I bring them up?”

“Please,” Anthy said, and Angelique went away at once.

The dining room had been rearranged for the occasion. The large family table had been moved to the kitchen, and in its place was a small round table designed just for two. It was covered with a heavy white cloth, and two fat white candles spread a steady warm light over its surface. A bowl sat in the middle, full of water, and floating on its surface were purple chrysanthemums and golden marigold.

The caterers brought up a steady stream of hot and cold food, set it out in the kitchen (with warming plates where needed), and bowed themselves out again. Angelique followed shortly afterwards.

“I’ll see you both tomorrow,” she said. “Have a wonderful evening.” She winked, her broad face full of kind amusement, and shut the door behind her.

Utena and Anthy were mostly silent over the hors d’oeuvres, watching each other with the new eyes that a special occasion brings. The ten years since their golden anniversary had brought new lines to their faces, of course, but those were marks to be treasured rather than shadows to be feared. What Anthy really noticed was how clear and bright Utena’s eyes were, how little they had really changed in sixty years. At her heart she was still the innocent, straight-forward girl she had been so long ago, the girl who had charged in and shattered every painful illusion keeping Anthy prisoner.

“You still sit so straight,” Utena said. “Your posture is perfect. I know you’ve probably had enough of such comparisons at this point, but you really do look like a queen, Anthy.”

Anthy found herself blushing, just a little.

“From you I will always accept those compliments.”

They exchanged presents with the fish, a long baked cod in a white wine sauce, with new potatoes set all around. Utena gave Anthy a silver bookmark, inset with a glittering black diamond. Anthy gave Utena a ring. Utena set it on her finger, smiling in a faintly surprised way.

“A ring? You don’t usually give jewellery as presents.”

“A good tradition is one worth breaking,” Anthy said, and then she laughed. “Oh Utena, I just wanted to give you something needlessly extravagant.”

Utena grinned and waved her hand. It was a gesture that sent Anthy straight back to Ohtori, though there was no other resemblance between the rings.

“It suits you very well,” she said, and applied herself to her fish.

“I can’t believe we’ve known each other for sixty years,” Utena said, when they were halfway through their steaks. “It still sounds impossible.”

“It’s the same for me,” Anthy said, her mouth full of new spinach and pine nuts.

“There was a time when I thought I wouldn’t make it.” Utena pressed her hand to her left breast. Anthy stopped eating, set down her fork, and reached over to take Utena’s free hand.

“I know. I was afraid too. But you did. And we will keep going for another while. We’re not over yet.”

Utena turned her hand over and rubbed Anthy’s knuckles with her palm.

“But it made me think. I didn’t want to die. I don’t. I want as many years with you as possible. But if I had, well it would have been a good life. I mean, it was pretty ordinary. We didn’t really do anything special. But we saw lots of the world, and we raised a family. We were happy.” She shot Anthy a cheeky smile. “We had more money than we could ever spend.”

Anthy laughed.

“Did I ever tell you where I got my trust fund?”

“No. You said you didn’t want me to know.”

Anthy nodded.

“I’d almost forgotten.” She took a sip of her wine and shrugged. “I stole it.” Utena looked faintly outraged, and like she wanted to start lecturing, so Anthy added quickly, “from my brother.”

Utena’s face relaxed all at once.

“Why did you never tell me? I wouldn’t have minded.”

Anthy shifted her food around on her plate.

“I didn’t want you to accept it because you hated him. I wanted you to accept it because you loved me.”

“Oh.” Utena paused, fumbled. “Well, that’s alright then.”

Anthy began chewing another piece of steak. It was well cooked, and she missed the faint bloody edge of a steak tartare, but her teeth were weakening. She could no longer manage tougher food.

“Anthy, what happened to him?”

Anthy, distracted by her food, had to backtrack to pick up the end of their conversation.

“To Akio?”

Utena nodded.

“He died not long after I left.”

Anthy still remembered the moment distinctly. It had been about three years after Ohtori. She and Utena were in a very fraught period of their relationship, trying to untangle the lies and betrayals they had been stained with by Akio. It had been December, just a few weeks before Christmas, and Anthy had been sitting in the garden outside their apartment, crying. All of a sudden, like a great pressure leaving her, she’d known that he was gone. The whole world seemed to exhale, the trees to stretch upwards and crackle and the frozen ground to warm beneath her feet. Her tears stayed cold on her cheeks as she stared at the sky, suddenly, impossibly free.

“Just like that?” Utena said, her eyes crinkling up with confusion.

“He was,” Anthy stopped and fumbled for the words. “He was not very real without me,” she said. “Sometimes I wonder if I dreamed him, gave him life, the way I gave the castle and the sword solidity.”

“I don’t like to think of it like that,” Utena said. “He was so vile. You definitely weren’t responsible for him.”

“Not for what he did, maybe,” Anthy said. “Though I thought at the time that I deserved it, and though I loved him for hurting me, because I was so sure that I needed to be hurt. But what he was he was because of me. When I stopped being the Witch, he had no way to be the Devil. Or the Prince. And he couldn't let himself be merely human, so he faded away. It’s almost sad.”

“Huh,” Utena said. “Well I hope you’ll still let me hate him, because I’ve been hating him for over half a century now, and I’m too old to change.” She winked, and her eyes creased up in a wrinkled smile, which Anthy returned.

“Oh, I assure you I hate him too. But with Akio, one emotion has never been enough.”

 

*

 

They finished their dinner with cheese, fruit, and small slices of Clementine cake, accompanied by sweet Madeira wine. When the food was gone, and the almost uncomfortable sensation of being completely full was fading, Utena stood up and moved over to the music player. She riffled through the tracks on the screen, switching them into a playlist, and then turned around and came back to Anthy.

“Will you dance with me?” she asked, holding out her hand.

“Of course.” Anthy took the offered hand, and using the table, pushed herself upright. Her knees creaked a little, the sign of a life spent on her feet, serving customers and moving around.

The removal of the big dining table had left them with plenty of space, and they stood together in the centre of the room as the first strains of music crept through the speakers. A drum beat tapping out three-four time and a chorus of female singers filled the room, and Anthy smiled.

“A very appropriate choice.”

Her feet found the steps they had never forgotten. She remembered the ancient temple dances of Greece, the mystic rhythms of Babylon. A waltz was comparatively simple. She let Utena lead, their hips hovering close together, Utena’s hand pressed firmly against the small of her back. They were perhaps a little slower than they had once been, and not so beautiful to look at, but the tension and passion that they found in each other had not faded in the slightest.

“You know,” Utena said, over the low and shivering chorus, “I had the strangest dream once. We were dancing like this, but on the surface of a lake, or maybe a still pond. Its surface was covered with roses, and between them I could see the stars.”

Anthy smiled.

“Was it when you were in hospital?”

Utena blinked.

“Maybe. I don’t really remember anymore. Why? Did it really happen?”

“Really?” Anthy’s eyes glittered. “Oh Utena, you above anyone should know what a silly question that is.”

Utena sighed.

“Someday you will give me a straight answer about magic, and it will probably kill you.”

“Probably.”

The next song came on, a section of Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet. Anthy, who had seen it performed in the Bolshoi Theatre, smiled fondly. It was like greeting an old friend.

They were about a minute into the song when Utena spoke again.

“Anthy, are you ever afraid of dying?” Her voice was steady, but the pressure of her fingers on Anthy’s waist increased.

Anthy sighed and set her head on Utena’s shoulder.

“Not really,” she said. “It makes me sad, because I love living. I think I’ve had a wonderful life. The only thing that worries me is the thought that you might die before me. That would be very hard, and very unfair.”

“Unfair?” Utena said, poking Anthy with one of the fingers on her waist. “How more so than you dying before me?”

“I’ve lost more than you,” Anthy said, not very seriously. She pulled back to look Utena in the eyes. “If you die, it will break my heart.”

“I know,” Utena said. “It’s the same for me. But when I die, I will die loving you, and my love will last in your memories, in our children, in everything that we did together.”

“You’re getting sentimental in your old age.”

“I was always sentimental. I just hide it less.”

They laughed, and Utena’s chin leaned forward to rest on Anthy’s shoulder.

“Do you ever miss it? You were immortal for thousands of years, and now you’ve grown old in sixty. Doesn’t that make you sad?”

“Never.” Anthy stepped back, breaking the dance completely, and pressed her hands to Utena’s face. “I’ve lived with you. I was only existing before.” She fumbled for the right words. “I’ve seen magic, and eternity, and I’ve had the power to look into people’s hearts and minds and know all their desires. I’ve moved in the spheres of myth and legend, walked in shadows and among the stars. And all those millennia of power and suffering were less real than one day of my life with you.”

She pulled Utena forward and kissed her, a burning, yearning kiss, full of love and desire. Utena shivered under her fingers, and her hands slid neatly around Anthy to clutch her tight. Anthy could feel the looseness of Utena’s skin under her fingertips, and the thinness of her lips.

They broke apart, and Utena was breathless and laughing.

“Well some things don’t change no matter who you are,” she said, her hands still firmly closed around Anthy. “Although I don’t think I can sweep you off your feet any more. Not physically, anyway.”

Anthy shifted to the side and slid her own arm around Utena’s waist.

“They physical sweeping was done a long time ago,” she said. “I’ve been swooning for you for many a year.”

“Hmm.” Utena’s tone was speculative, and her eyes were bright. “I should point out that our bedroom is only a few feet away.”

Anthy tried to keep her expression straight, and failed.

“Lead on, my dear, lead on.”

They left the remains of dinner behind them, to cool and congeal until morning, and the playlist to run through a host of romantic songs that they never even heard.


End file.
